Climate Change’s ‘Blob’ Heats Up In Northeast Pacific

They call it The Blob. No, it’s not some campy 1950s horror flick featuring a gelatinous monstrosity from space aimed at devouring all life in its path. This Blob is a pool of much hotter than normal water that has become increasingly entrenched in the North-East Pacific. A surface zone of record ocean warmth that has persisted and intensified in the same region for the better part of two years.

Though it’s not the sci-fi movie Blob, this particular climate change monstrosity could well be described as stranger than fiction. It’s an ocean feature of the Ridiculously Resilient Ridge which has warded storms off the North American West Coast over the past couple of years. A likely upshot of an ongoing Arctic heating — setting off weather conditions that sparked both this year’s massive Northwest Territory Wildfires and the worst drought the California region has seen in at least 1,000 years. And like the sci-fi movie space monster of yore, the Northeast Pacific heat Blob has a nasty penchant for devouring ocean life of all kinds.

(Under an ongoing El Nino, the Equatorial Pacific is getting pretty hot with temperature spikes ranging from +2.5 C above normal temperatures at mid-ocean to +4 C above average off the West Coast of South America. But these rather warm temperature anomalies are nothing compared to The Blob [at center frame above] which now features temperatures in the range of +5 C above average. Image source: Earth Nullschool.)

The news about The Blob today comes in two forms — bad and worse. The bad news is that it’s still there. Still influencing our weather, still threatening sea life and fisheries. And the worse news is that it appears to be heating up. Today’s readings put much of The Blob in the 3.5 to 5.5 C above average temperature range, which is 1.5 to 2 degrees Celsius warmer than we’ve seen in this zone since its first heat intensification during the spring of 2014.

Wonky Weather

Back in April, a study published in Geophysical Research Letters and reported in LiveScience found that temperatures over a broad region of Northeast Pacific surface waters had averaged between 1-4 C (2 to 7 F) above normal temperatures. It covered an area roughly 1,000 miles in diameter and extended about 300 feet below surface waters.

“In the fall of 2013 and early 2014 we started to notice a big, almost circular mass of water that just didn’t cool off as much as it usually did, so by spring of 2014 it was warmer than we had ever seen it for that time of year.”

(Warm Blob T anomalies for April of 2014 as provided by NOAA and AGU. Note that today’s anomalies are well in excess of April 2014 readings.)

The Blob’s large size combined with its failure to cool in spring to set off some rather strange weather impacts, according to the report’s findings. Winds blowing over high heat content ocean waters ran inland over the US and Canadian West Coasts. This invasion pushed warm air over lands and mountains. Snowpacks melted, lands warmed and dried out. Massive wildfires erupted thoughout both the US and Canada.

The hot air mass over the warm water blob has acted as a brutish atmospheric feature since this time. Like a towering wall of air it has consistently deflected oncoming storms that typically charge across the Pacific During Winter and Spring — reinforcing a weird extreme weather regime.

Threat to Sea Life

The AGU report also cited recent severe impacts to sea life as found in a March 17 study by NOAA. Highlights of the NOAA study showed substantial ocean life impacts including weaker copopod production in the warming waters, likely less vital salmon fisheries, bird deaths, marine mammal deaths and starving sea lions due to scarcity of food sources. In addition, the warm temperatures have been linked to a starfish wasting sickness that has killed off millions of sea stars up and down the North American West Coast.

What the NOAA report did not include was growing evidence that warming waters off the US West Coast have (when combined with eutriphication due to atmospheric nitrogen seeding through fossil fuel burning and farm nutrient runoff), since the early 2000s, resulted in increasingly dangerous low ocean oxygen levels (see Starving Sea Lion Pups and Liquified Starfish). It’s a one-two warming and oxygen loss that is pretty amazingly dangerous to ocean life.

The NOAA study further noted that the high sea surface temperatures spurring these impacts were at or near unprecedented levels, a confirmation of the AGU report findings:

“We are in some ways entering a situation we haven’t seen before,” said Cisco Werner, Director of the Southwest Fisheries Science Center in La Jolla, Calif. “That makes it all the more important to look at how these conditions affect the entire ecosystem because different components and different species may be affected differently.”

PDO and Climate Change Not Helping

The current unprecedented warm temperatures in The Blob are, in part, an upshot of a warmer sea surface state now in effect called positive Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO). During these times, Pacific Ocean waters tend to be warmer — especially in the region where the Blob has recently emerged. During December of 2014, PDO hit new all-time record high values — an extreme likely pushed over the top by added atmospheric and ocean heating through human greenhouse gas emissions.

During positive PDO periods, El Nino events both tend to be more prevalent and show higher intensity. And during spring and summer El Ninos, we tend to see increased warming of the Pacific region now dominated by The Blob.

All these PDO based fluxes are natural variability related. But the real kicker, the icing on the cake of this extreme event is almost certainly climate change. Specifically for the hot Blob zone, general greenhouse gas warming of the adjacent Arctic called Polar Amplification has tended to generate a weakness in the Jet Stream directly over the region. This weakness has tended to aid in Ridiculously Resilient Ridge development and the month on month, year on year heatwaves that have pushed ocean temperatures in this zone into ever more extreme hot values (see Dr. Francis’s “Weird Weather Plot ThickensAs Arctic Swiftly Warms“). And though overall global warming now in the range of +0.95 C above 1880s values has also likely contributed in a broader sense, the direct impact to the Arctic has likely aided in the development of a high anomaly heat spike for this particular ocean zone.

So, in total, we have a number of factors pushing record ocean warmth in this region, setting the stage for sea creature death and wrecked North American weather alike. But the primary contributor to these unsettling events is almost certainly climate change. For its influences have made possible the new levels of extreme conditions which we are now experiencing.

100 Comments

labmonkery2

Another great article, which confirms my earlier review of the nullschool feed regarding that Ridge of Ridiculous Resiliency and its associated heat source/sink – aka The Blob (seems to be a symbiotic relationship?). I can only assume that this heat pump is what’s impacting the fires in the PNW with the constant drying of the tundra. And will eventually release, or play a large role in the release, of this carbon store. Do we have any idea from the models if/when this condition will remedy itself? Or is this the new ‘normal?’
Thanks again for your insight. I share your knowledge with all I know – some of them are “Hooked on Fox” and cannot be swayed…but I try.

A strong storm track intensification by Fall/Winter (2015-2016) and then switch to La Nina would help somewhat, tamping down some of those high T deltas. But this particular El Nino seems to be set on a drawn-out affair that has tended to shift toward mid ocean heating in the Equatorial zone by Fall. If that happens, we might have to wait until at least Spring 2016 to see some shifts back to milder conditions. The current atmospherics favor this trend. Another strong WWB would push toward more storm track intensification. But right now it is basically at full stop.

Andy in San Diego

I’ve been watching the news regarding Oarfish washing up. The west coast of the US has seen a bunch. Their diet is crustaceans. Perhaps their food source is becoming more scarce, and as Oarfish are higher on the food chain the chain reaction may be climbing up to the more complex life forms (such as the seals dying in droves that we’ve seen).

The Blob has been cooking us up here in the non-air conditioned U.S. Pacific Northwest for several days now, but we did get some temperature relief yesterday. Still, there’s no rain anywhere in sight for this region which normally doesn’t dry out until mid-summer. Earlier this spring, Washington governor Jay Inslee declared an emergency over the dangerously low snow pack upon which much of the state’s agriculture depends.

Gov Browns call to reduce this to 1990 levels so we can continue to emit over 400 million Toxic Tons a year, will not help us stop or slow down Global Warming and Sea Levels Rising.

“Updates to the 2020 Limit.
Calculation of the original 1990 limit approved in 2007 was revised using the scientifically updated IPCC 2007 fourth assessment report (AR4) global warming potentials, to 431 MMTCO2e. Thus the 2020 GHG emissions limit established in response to AB 32 is now slightly higher than the 427 MMTCO2e in the initial Scoping Plan.” Ca. Gov. Data

We Need 100% Renewable Energies .

No Twin Tunnels, Save the Delta, this Fragile Eco-System is a measurement of our commitment to bring in Sustainable Energy Policies.

Our California Residential Feed-In Tariff should start out at 16 cents per kilowatt hour, 5 cents per kilowatt hour to the Utility for use of the Grid, 11 cents per kilowatt hour going to the Home Owner.

Colorado Bob

Computer models are in firm agreement that El Niño conditions will strengthen further during the latter part of 2015. All eight of the international models tracked by BOM show Niño3.4 readings of 1.5°C or higher by October (see Figure 2), and several exceed 2.0°C, suggesting that the strongest event since 1997–98 may well be in the cards. Some models predicted that a significant El Niño would emerge in mid-2014, but that didn’t happen, largely because the atmosphere failed to respond to oceanic shifts that often kick off El Niño. This time, the atmosphere and ocean are much more in sync, so we can put more trust in the current model outlooks—especially now that we’re past the “spring predictability barrier” that makes early-year forecasts of El Niño so tough. In today’s update, NOAA is calling for a greater than 90% chance that El Niño will continue through the northern fall of 2015, and around an 85% chance it will last through the winter of 2015-16.

In a few words — we’d be more worried about other catastrophic consequences from volcanic activity powerful enough to warm 1,000 x 1,000 miles of ocean even 1 C, much less 3-5.

And a few more — this is a feature of the ocean surface. Volcanic activity would warm bottom waters and only very local to the event. You’re talking maybe hundreds of yards around the eruption zone and in a column near the event telegraphing to the surface.

It takes a ridiculous, stupendous amount of energy to warm so much water in this way. You’d need a shallow ocean and a massive catastrophic flood basalt and then, maybe.

sunkensheep

Interestingly, somebody asked this elsewhere, and I found a study estimating the heat output from volcanic vents. It is relatively insignificant, and the ocean will tend to spread that kind of localised heating out.
I don’t have the link right now, but the poster claimed that since they couldn’t open it (tested working on multiple machines and ISPs), my statement was invalid. They were truly taking denialism to the extreme.

“The hot air mass over the warm water blob has acted as a brutish atmospheric feature…
… a towering wall of air.”
Very good!

The Blob + the Ridge = The Blidge – Ruler of EPac.
I really think that the rapid and extreme changes (water,air, land) in the E. Pacific, PNW, AK, and NWT. comprise a most spectacular and extreme climate ‘change’ event.
This developed much quicker than anything else I can think of.

And the nitrogen saturation that has been growing and looming larger by the day. Many thanks.

“… when combined with eutriphication due to atmospheric nitrogen seeding through fossil fuel burning…”

james cole

Canadian Wildfires in the North West regions made themselves felt across Northern Minnesota on Tuesday. The Monday evening sky began to fill with high level smoke, blotting out the sun. Morning brought smoke in the atmosphere able to blot out the landscape. Visibility was cut to nil for most of the day.
Just another sign of a changing world. In the 80’s writers claimed in the 2000’s we would begin to experience the rise of wildfires across the northern hemisphere, and skies would fill with smoke. I give them credit, they were right, I’ve lived to confirm what early global warming science was saying.
Now it looks like our great life support system, the seas, are taking the brunt of warming. When those systems strain and collapse, we will have the worst case the early scientists predicted.

Greg

Robert, I really don’t get these ocean heating events. Why in this location? Did currents bring the heat in from elsewhere and they’re stuck there? I can get atmospheric blocks based on jet stream dynamics but ocean blocks? Is it a giant eddie of sorts or do we just not know? Thanks.

jyyh

Yep, that’s the main temporary dead end for surface currents, a proper El Nino should open the gate back to south. Think of it as a heat dump for 75% of Oceans outside polar areas, an intercooler of sorts… I think there’s at least one similar sort of area in the world ocean (in Indian Ocean) but that works in reverse wrt this one.

1. Ocean heat transport due to PDO El Niño related changes. This includes surface winds, upwelling, and near surface current changes.
2. The heightening and uneven ghg heat contribution to the atmosphere which directly impacts the ocean surface and near ocean surface temperature. Major factors include the impact of polar amplification on ridge formation and subsequent heatwave development over this region of the Pacific. The consistent, much warmer than normal atmospheric pattern heats up the ocean surface.
3. Less heat exchange/mixing. Over the years, the Pacific Ocean has become more stratified. This stratification increases the intensity of hot pools that do develop as there is less mixing with cooler waters near hot zones, allowing them to amplify.
4. The general and overall expansion of equatorial to polar heat transport during phase 1 climate change.

These are probably the big impacts. There are likely a few more peripheral ones. One thing to consider is the fact that ghg is an extraordinarily powerful vehicle for ocean and atmospheric heat accumulation. Nuclear weapons and volcanoes don’t hold a candle to it. It’s an invisible heat giant and its ability to generate geophysical change through the mechanism of temperature variance and increase is unmatched in the natural world sans the sun blowing up or snuffing out (slow solar changes and minor variability don’t hold a candle to it).

We can plainly see that now in the Northeast Pacific. This kind of heating would take hundreds of thousands of volcanoes, millions of nuclear weapons. But the human ghg heat forcing has achieved it with a terrible ease.

Loni

Andy in San Diego

At first I thought it would be an interesting exercise. Go back through news by date regarding the eastern pacific breakdown. How the early articles reference such things as acidification and phytoplankton deaths. Those stories began interleaving with shellfish deaths, starfish deaths then bird deaths. Gradually the seal deaths and oarfish deaths joined in chronologically. Killer whales began to appear as they started hunting new food sources and starving. As you read the article titles, you can see the spread of death geographically as new areas report the surges within their locale.

I thought it would be interesting, in the end it was sobering. Here is a list of articles, chronologically ordered.

Normally I don’t agree with many views of conservative/business interests, but when they recognize that action must be taken to fight AGW then I take notice. Their conclusion is that deniers will soon exist only in fossil fuel funded think tanks and lunatic conspiracy groups. Let’s hope that’s sooner rather than later. I’m still disturbed by the way 2C is thrown around as an acceptable outcome that will still produce profits and growth under our current economic paradigm.

We’re getting some really ugly waves here, and yesterday received rain all day and heavy rain in the night. That’s typical for February and March, but it’s really crazy to have the sloppy weather at this time of the year. “El Nino’ is what the locals are saying.. Ha, I’m preaching to the choir, but just confirming from my spot on the equator here in Ecuador. Z

Yes, the people of this area still talk about the ’97-98 Fenonomen ‘ of El Nino, and also remember the severe earthquake that hit Bahia de Caraquez during that time.
I don’t comment on your posts often, but I always appreciate what you share. If there’s an abnormal variant in weather, I lob that news in your direction so it’s recorded/confirmed. The ugly waves were a surprise…

ha.. perdon.. ugly ocean waves, yet the intense rain we received yesterday and last night was quite abnormal. we’ve received more rain in may and june than we did in the ‘rainy season.’ this is usually the dry season, though people say that in El Nino years this is normal.

As for the ocean waves: the full-moon spring tide came with no problems, and then the ocean waves festered and became very ugly over the weekend.

the acceleration of beach loss started 18 months ago, though it’s happening in other areas of the coast (and world.)

the municipalities think the best option is rock. friends and i looked at a bamboo project up the coast that seems to have potential… driving 15-meter sections of bamboo straight down until they hit solid bottom,.. so there’s a fence of bamboo with one meter sticking above the sand and 15 or so reaching all the way down to the bottom.. Then another line and another to terrace —the bamboo fence traps the sand yet filters the water…

we’ll be working on an experiment very soon and hope to have it in place before the next ‘aguaje’… we’re still gathering facts and rounding up materials and estimates of costs.

they are receiving little help from the local municipality, which has its hands full with other problems…

Just large… I will be returning to that beach tomorrow and will critique the waves and will also ask the people who live there. I live nearby on the last bend of a mangrove river and can usually hear the waves slamming the shore when it’s bad over there.

your feedback is greatly appreciated — this will scare my neighbors, but it’s beter to know what to expect. we feel like a group of kindergarten students that have been turned loose with responsibility of protecting a fort without any supervision, as far as making informed decisions. thanks so much.

Thanks for the feedback/conditions report from the South, Playamart! One aspect of this comments section I love is the fact that Robert has so many readers from around the globe that can provide realtime observations on the ground, often in areas discussed in his posts. To read about a particular event, then have the information confirmed by locals on the ground makes for a very convincing and surreal position. I wish you all the best in your future challenges/work. Your are one small part of a very large and necessary solution.

Colorado Bob

A key potential ‘benefit’ of global warming–namely, that plants at northern latitudes will thrive in a warmer world–is challenged by a new study released by University of Hawai’i scientists today.

The prevailing assumption ignores the fact that plants in the North will remain limited by solar radiation, curbing positive effects of warming and additional CO2 availability. In addition, that same warming could surpass plant temperature tolerances in tropical areas around the world, and further be accompanied by drought.

“Those that think climate change will benefit plants need to see the light, literally and figuratively,” says Camilo Mora, professor at the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa’s College of Social Sciences and lead author of the new study. “A narrow focus on the factors that influence plant growth has led to major underestimations of the potential impacts of climate change on plants, not only at higher latitudes but more severely in the tropics, exposing the world to dire consequences,” he adds.

climatehawk1

Colorado Bob

A new study of tree rings from Mongolia dating back more than 1,000 years confirms that recent warming in central Asia has no parallel in any known record. In recent decades, temperatures have been ascending more rapidly here than in much of the world, but scientists have lacked much evidence to put the trend into a long-term context. The study does not explicitly raise the issue of human-induced warming, but is sure to be seen as one more piece of evidence that it is at work. The study appears in the journal Quaternary Science Reviews.

Colorado Bob

Changing climate prompts boreal forest shift
June 11, 2015
Source:
University of Alaska Fairbanks
Summary:
With warming summer temperatures across Alaska, white spruce tree growth in Interior Alaska has declined to record low levels, while the same species in Western Alaska is growing better than ever measured before. According to researchers, ‘The movement of an entire biome is often hypothesized in models of probable future climate, but the Alaska boreal forest is actually shifting today, and the process is well underway.’

Colorado Bob

The Fate of Trees: How Climate Change May Alter Forests WorldwideBy the end of the century, the woodlands of the Southwest will likely be reduced to weeds and shrubs. And scientists worry that the rest of the planet may see similar effects

Colorado Bob

The Louisiana Gulf Coast and the city of New Orleans are in trouble. Land there is sinking below sea level rapidly, faster than anywhere else in the world, at rates that scientists predict the rest of the world will see only at the end of this century.

This erosion has been going on since the Mississippi was re-routed in 1932 to protect communities from the river’s seasonal flooding — but those same floods used to carry sediment that restored land washed out to sea by erosion and storms.

About 2,000 square miles of Louisiana have disappeared from the coast already. Climate change and the more frequent powerful storms that are expected as result, along with rising sea levels, are expected to exacerbate these problems.

Fortunately, there is a master plan in place to save the Gulf Coast. But it’s a 50-year, $50 billion plan, and so far, the money is not there.

Robert In New Orleans

Come on Mr. Bob, you know as well as anyone else who studies the science that New Orleans is toast. It is just a matter of how soon and how bad things will get before hand that is open to discussion. The state of Louisiana doesn’t have the money to fund this project and the federal government isn’t going pay for this modern day Maginot Line in the mud.

Colorado Bob

A huge swath of unusually warm water that has drawn tropical fish and turtles to the normally cool West Coast over the past year has grown to the biggest and longest-lasting ocean temperature anomaly on record, researchers now say, profoundly affecting climate and marine life from Baja California to Alaska.

Researchers remain uncertain what caused the mass of warm seawater they simply call “the blob,” or what it’ll mean long term for the West Coast climate. But they agree it’s imperative to better understand its impact, as it may be linked to everything from California’s drought to record numbers of marine mammals washing up on Northern California shores.

Is it wrong if I find joy in kicking fossil fuel cheerleaders off my site or when they send me threat notes telling me never to post again. To me that’s just confirmation that we’re doing the right thing. Always have enjoyed bloodying the noses of bullies.

Colorado Bob

Hey Robert.
Really: “…fossil fuel cheerleaders off my site or when they send me threat notes telling me never to post again.”?
Did you get threatening messages from FF liars?
Your truths speak louder than threats or lies.
Don’t back down. You have honest compassionate people here to cover your back too.
DT

(At least you get threats. All I ever got with my biting documentary air pollution photo posts were shouts of, “Chemtrails!”.)
🙂

Oh, they start with chemtrails, then they move on to doom, then they sprinkle in a little nonsense about fossil fuels being the center of civilization, then they try to confuse you with stuff like miniscule contributions of human breath, minor, minor trace gasses or volcanoes, then failing all that and more they start making threats (and probably try a little hacking on the side. Note to the idiot that keeps screwing with my DNS handshakes to NOAA and BOM — it’s not working, you’re the worst hacker ever.).

So yeah, you should be proud🙂 Attempts at spreading misinformation from fossil fuel cheerleaders on your site is the blogger version of a red badge of courage.

regarding FF cheerleaders– there are two types that tend to interbreed, those that deny the finite resource constraints of oil and those that deny the impact of CO2. What they don’t seem to understand is the impact of the combination. Read my The Oil Conundrum available online via the intertubes to get a deconstruction of the arguments.

You’ve got those who claim there’s not enough FF for climate change to hit certain markers. Of course oil is resource constrained, especially in an economic sense when it comes to extraction. But if FF special interests rule governing bodies they’ll say to hell with economics and keep drilling and burning the stuff til the world be damned. They’ll basically subsidize the bad economic policy of unsustainable extraction to support the failing and destructive industry. Probably the worst form of state support for industry ever invented.

And there is most certainly enough stuff in the ground, no matter how difficult and uneconomical to extract to really, really wreck things if bozos like Abbott and oil industry aligned politicians around the world keep pushing things as they do. Setting up these backwards and quite frankly dastardly policies that enforce fossil fuel burning and keep people captive to its consumption.

Robert, you SHOULD feel overjoyed when you excercise your responsibility for removing FF shills who have sold out our future for a quick buck. You’re definitely doing the right thing, and have many here (including myself, of course) who will be behind you and support you for as long as you have the strength and courage to continue this fight! You are a treasured resource and provider of essential information. We thank you for all you do, and continue to do, to spread awareness and info that is free from the tentacles of the fossil fuel monster.

May rainfall most ever in United States US officials: Rain fell in dramatic totals in 20 states, for country as a whole
– Author: By Steve Almasy CNN

…In 121 years of record keeping, never had an average of 4.36 inches of precipitation fallen on the contiguous United States. The number was 1.45 inches above the long-term average for the months, the National Centers for Environmental Information said. It beat the old mark by .07 inches.
Three states — Colorado, Oklahoma and Texas — set record totals for rainfall in May. In Oklahoma and Texas, where flooding killed dozens, precipitation was almost two times the average and the most in any month ever. “The main culprit was a stuck weather pattern…http://www.wfmz.com/news/may-rainfall-most-ever-in-united-states/33516140

Colorado Bob

We already knew Alaska was having some crazy weather lately. That included a record 91 degrees in Eagle in May, the “hottest temperature ever recorded so early in the calendar year in our 49th state,” per our own Capital Weather Gang.

And now, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reports that the state as a whole experienced its warmest May in the weather books. As the agency puts it:

The Alaska statewide average temperature for May was the warmest on record in 91 years of record keeping at 44.9°F, 7.1°F above average. The warmth in Alaska was widespread with several cities were record warm, including Barrow and Juneau.

SONOMA, Calif. (AP) — California is taking desperate steps to save the last endangered salmon in Wine Country creeks that are going dry because of over-pumping and the drought, officials said Thursday.

Water has run so low in the four tributaries of the Russian River in Sonoma County that state workers have been dispatched with nets and buckets to rescue the last surviving coho salmon.

Threatened steelhead trout are also being pulled from drying stretches of the waterways.

DonnaLou

I followed a blogger years back that wrote mainly about war issues, specifically Iraq. His website was devoted to dispersing news articles from around the world that related to the war. He received cease-and-desist notes, along with website crashes, and eventually he reported that “they” showed up at his home in the form of mysterious, trench coated men (yes, trench coats). Please be careful! You are the first source I turn to for the real story. Thank you for the work that you (and all your fellow commenters) do.

Yes, one could hope. Of course I think what would help the most is simply turning off Faux News. If a network could ever be charged with inciting violence against the government, it would definitely be Fox.